Procrastination: P-R-O-C-R-A-S-T-I-O-N. Procrastination. The putting off of something that should have been done a long time ago. Such as... buying school supplies for three kids. In french.
I usually refer to my school supply lists as the annual scavenger hunt. Because that's what it feels like here. I've never had to buy school supplies in the U.S., my experience is based on what I remember from my own school days. But the lists here are COMPLICATED! Even my francophone friends say-so. Let's talk about art paper, for example. The list does not say to buy "art paper." It says, something like, "size A4, 224 grams." But in French. Which would be fine except that then, the different papers aren't marked size A4, it's marked 35 cm x 47 cm with a weight of 220 grams. But in French. And it costs 10 euros per pad of paper, so I don't want to buy the wrong one because returning anything here is just a general old pain in the you-know-what. And each list requires two different kinds of papers (colored and white) and there are three lists, and no teacher specifies the same paper in the same way, so that means six different kinds of paper. And that's just the paper.
There is no Target with the giant corner dedicated to any and everything "back-to-school." My Belgian friends will say, "but what about Carrefour Planet, and their school supply aisles?" To that I say, you don't know Target. And then they will say, "but you also have Dreamland and Club for anything you can't find at Carrefour," and to that I say, exactly my point. It is impossible to buy school supplies here without going to each and every one of those stores. Thus, the reason I call it the annual scavenger hunt.
But this year, I procrastinated. I didn't even look at the lists until last week. Sigh. I paid for that. Over the years, I've developed a strategy. My strategy is that I try to figure out as much as I can on the list by myself, and then at each different store, I pick one item that I have no clue about, and then I ask an unsuspecting clerk to help me with that one item. If they are nice, I push it to a second item.
This year, I actually knew what everything on the list was before I went into the stores. Mostly because I made A.J. sit down and read them all and help me. Then, I made them all come to the store with me. I handed the older ones their lists and pointed them in the right direction within each part of the school supply aisle. Divide and conquer, I thought. Not really. It was a lot of me yelling "focus" and "No, Miss B, you don't need [a stapler/white out tape/file cabinet/insert whatever-other-obnoxious-item-she-was-holding-at-that-particular-moment]. But I never needed to call on any sales staff for assistance. I was proud.
But we managed to get through most of it. We still needed a few things, but I knew that Dreamland would have the grid paper (specified 1cm squares) that the boys both needed and a few other things. My confidence restored, we saved that for later in the week. Only, when we got there, they were out of the right paper. For this, I decided to ask a clerk. She took me to the shelf I had just been staring at, shook her head and said "pas encore" (no more) and then she ran. I'm not kidding, she ducked away from me before I could ask for anything else. I hadn't planned on asking for anything else, but she never would have given me a chance. I spotted her a few minutes later, hiding in a different aisle checking her watch. (It was almost lunch time.)
I guess back-to-school shopping isn't just hard on the moms that have to do it.
This year's statistics so far: five different stores, two items to return/exchange and a couple more to get. I'll figure it all out. Eventually.
Even after all this time, I still miss Target.
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